If you do not vote for this guy, you'll probably go to hell.

from Barack Obama's "Call to Renewal" keynote address:

Faith doesn't mean that you don't have doubts.

You need to come to church in the first place precisely because you are first of this world, not apart from it. You need to embrace Christ precisely because you have sins to wash away - because you are human and need an ally in this difficult journey.

It was because of these newfound understandings that I was finally able to walk down the aisle of Trinity United Church of Christ on 95th Street in the Southside of Chicago one day and affirm my Christian faith. It came about as a choice, and not an epiphany. I didn't fall out in church. The questions I had didn't magically disappear. But kneeling beneath that cross on the South Side, I felt that I heard God's spirit beckoning me. I submitted myself to His will, and dedicated myself to discovering His truth.

That's a path that has been shared by millions upon millions of Americans - evangelicals, Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Muslims alike; some since birth, others at certain turning points in their lives. It is not something they set apart from the rest of their beliefs and values. In fact, it is often what drives their beliefs and their values...

But, you know, my Bible tells me that if we train a child in the way he should go, when he is old he will not turn from it. So I think faith and guidance can help fortify a young woman's sense of self, a young man's sense of responsibility, and a sense of reverence that all young people should have for the act of sexual intimacy.

I am not suggesting that every progressive suddenly latch on to religious terminology - that can be dangerous. Nothing is more transparent than inauthentic expressions of faith...

I do not believe that religious people have a monopoly on morality, I would rather have someone who is grounded in morality and ethics, and who is also secular, affirm their morality and ethics and values without pretending that they're something they're not. They don't need to do that. None of us need to do that.

But what I am suggesting is this - secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, Williams Jennings Bryant, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King - indeed, the majority of great reformers in American history - were not only motivated by faith, but repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause. So to say that men and women should not inject their "personal morality" into public policy debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

Moreover, if we progressives shed some of these biases, we might recognize some overlapping values that both religious and secular people share when it comes to the moral and material direction of our country. We might recognize that the call to sacrifice on behalf of the next generation, the need to think in terms of "thou" and not just "I," resonates in religious congregations all across the country. And we might realize that we have the ability to reach out to the evangelical community and engage millions of religious Americans in the larger project of American renewal...

So the question is, how do we build on these still-tentative partnerships between religious and secular people of good will? It's going to take more work, a lot more work than we've done so far. The tensions and the suspicions on each side of the religious divide will have to be squarely addressed. And each side will need to accept some ground rules for collaboration.

While I've already laid out some of the work that progressive leaders need to do, I want to talk a little bit about what conservative leaders need to do -- some truths they need to acknowledge.

For one, they need to understand the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy, but the robustness of our religious practice. Folks tend to forget that during our founding, it wasn't the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment. It was the persecuted minorities, it was Baptists like John Leland who didn't want the established churches to impose their views on folks who were getting happy out in the fields and teaching the scripture to slaves. It was the forbearers of the evangelicals who were the most adamant about not mingling government with religious, because they did not want state-sponsored religion hindering their ability to practice their faith as they understood it.

Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.

And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles.

This brings me to my second point. Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all.

Now this is going to be difficult for some who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, as many evangelicals do. But in a pluralistic democracy, we have no choice. Politics depends on our ability to persuade each other of common aims based on a common reality. It involves the compromise, the art of what's possible. At some fundamental level, religion does not allow for compromise. It's the art of the impossible. If God has spoken, then followers are expected to live up to God's edicts, regardless of the consequences. To base one's life on such uncompromising commitments may be sublime, but to base our policy making on such commitments would be a dangerous thing. And if you doubt that, let me give you an example.

We all know the story of Abraham and Isaac. Abraham is ordered by God to offer up his only son, and without argument, he takes Isaac to the mountaintop, binds him to an altar, and raises his knife, prepared to act as God has commanded.

Of course, in the end God sends down an angel to intercede at the very last minute, and Abraham passes God's test of devotion.

But it's fair to say that if any of us leaving this church saw Abraham on a roof of a building raising his knife, we would, at the very least, call the police and expect the Department of Children and Family Services to take Isaac away from Abraham. We would do so because we do not hear what Abraham hears, do not see what Abraham sees, true as those experiences may be. So the best we can do is act in accordance with those things that we all see, and that we all hear, be it common laws or basic reason.

Finally, any reconciliation between faith and democratic pluralism requires some sense of proportion.

This goes for both sides.

Even those who claim the Bible's inerrancy make distinctions between Scriptural edicts, sensing that some passages - the Ten Commandments, say, or a belief in Christ's divinity - are central to Christian faith, while others are more culturally specific and may be modified to accommodate modern life.

The American people intuitively understand this, which is why the majority of Catholics practice birth control and some of those opposed to gay marriage nevertheless are opposed to a Constitutional amendment to ban it. Religious leadership need not accept such wisdom in counseling their flocks, but they should recognize this wisdom in their politics.

But a sense of proportion should also guide those who police the boundaries between church and state. Not every mention of God in public is a breach to the wall of separation - context matters. It is doubtful that children reciting the Pledge of Allegiance feel oppressed or brainwashed as a consequence of muttering the phrase "under God." I didn't. Having voluntary student prayer groups use school property to meet should not be a threat, any more than its use by the High School Republicans should threaten Democrats. And one can envision certain faith-based programs - targeting ex-offenders or substance abusers - that offer a uniquely powerful way of solving problems.

So we all have some work to do here. But I am hopeful that we can bridge the gaps that exist and overcome the prejudices each of us bring to this debate. And I have faith that millions of believing Americans want that to happen. No matter how religious they may or may not be, people are tired of seeing faith used as a tool of attack. They don't want faith used to belittle or to divide. They're tired of hearing folks deliver more screed than sermon. Because in the end, that's not how they think about faith in their own lives.

So let me end with just one other interaction I had during my campaign. A few days after I won the Democratic nomination in my U.S. Senate race, I received an email from a doctor at the University of Chicago Medical School that said the following:

"Congratulations on your overwhelming and inspiring primary win. I was happy to vote for you, and I will tell you that I am seriously considering voting for you in the general election. I write to express my concerns that may, in the end, prevent me from supporting you."

The doctor described himself as a Christian who understood his commitments to be "totalizing." His faith led him to a strong opposition to abortion and gay marriage, although he said that his faith also led him to question the idolatry of the free market and quick resort to militarism that seemed to characterize much of the Republican agenda.

But the reason the doctor was considering not voting for me was not simply my position on abortion. Rather, he had read an entry that my campaign had posted on my website, which suggested that I would fight "right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose." The doctor went on to write:

"I sense that you have a strong sense of justice...and I also sense that you are a fair minded person with a high regard for reason...Whatever your convictions, if you truly believe that those who oppose abortion are all ideologues driven by perverse desires to inflict suffering on women, then you, in my judgment, are not fair-minded....You know that we enter times that are fraught with possibilities for good and for harm, times when we are struggling to make sense of a common polity in the context of plurality, when we are unsure of what grounds we have for making any claims that involve others...I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words."

Fair-minded words.

So I looked at my website and found the offending words. In fairness to them, my staff had written them using standard Democratic boilerplate language to summarize my pro-choice position during the Democratic primary, at a time when some of my opponents were questioning my commitment to protect Roe v. Wade.

Re-reading the doctor's letter, though, I felt a pang of shame. It is people like him who are looking for a deeper, fuller conversation about religion in this country. They may not change their positions, but they are willing to listen and learn from those who are willing to speak in fair-minded words. Those who know of the central and awesome place that God holds in the lives of so many, and who refuse to treat faith as simply another political issue with which to score points.

So I wrote back to the doctor, and I thanked him for his advice. The next day, I circulated the email to my staff and changed the language on my website to state in clear but simple terms my pro-choice position. And that night, before I went to bed, I said a prayer of my own - a prayer that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me.

And that night, before I went to bed I said a prayer of my own. It's a prayer I think I share with a lot of Americans. A hope that we can live with one another in a way that reconciles the beliefs of each with the good of all. It's a prayer worth praying, and a conversation worth having in this country in the months and years to come.

Thank you.

Margaret's Lighthouse

This is a story about a little girl who lives in a house on the edge of a cliff at the end of a road on the outskirts of town near a lighthouse…

There is a little girl who lives on the edge of a cliff at the end of a road on the outskirts of town near a lighthouse.

The lighthouse is tall and long and can be seen for miles and miles from the north, south, east and west – and when the leaves on the trees have all fallen in autumn the girl can see the lighthouse from her bedroom window.

Her bedroom is on the second floor of the two-story house on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse.

The girl's name is Margaret.

Margaret has light brown hair that rests on her shoulders, but sometimes covers her face when the wind blows. She has green-colored eyes and olive-colored skin.

Margaret has a sweet, chubby face and freckles on her nose.

Margaret likes to pretend that she is the keeper of the lighthouse on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town. She walks the steps of the lighthouse – up, up, winding, up, up and around until she reaches the very top. The light in her lighthouse is bright and warm and yellow and orange and big, and it hurts her eyes to look at it.

Margaret stands at the very top of her lighthouse on the edge of a cliff at the end of a road on the outskirts of town and she looks out into the ocean and sees boats floating and fish swimming and waves crashing and sailors sailing and fishermen fishing and surfers surfing and seagulls flying, and then she smiles.

One cold, wet, dark, dreary night when the sun had gone down and the moon was covered with clouds and the stars were all sleeping behind the deep, grey sky and Margaret was tucked neatly in her bed, the light in her lighthouse was blown out by a gust of wintry wind.

Margaret was frightened. Her room on the second floor of the two-story house on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse became very, very dark.

Margaret looked for her flashlight.

It is a blue flashlight with small yellow and green stickers in the shapes of half moons and stars stuck to the sides. Margaret always smiled when she thought about her flashlight. "There are no green stars," she thought.

Margaret began crawling around her bedroom floor feeling for the flashlight because she wanted to see what was happening with her lighthouse. The light in the lighthouse had never been blown out by the wind or the rain or the snow that sometimes floats to the ground in wintertime.

Finally, Margaret found her blue flashlight with the yellow and green stars and half moons and she smiled and then shined the small light out of her window at the lighthouse on the on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town. For hours and hours and longer it seemed, Margaret shined her flashlight out at her lighthouse hoping that somehow its bright and warm and yellow and orange light would begin to burn and blaze and shine into her room.

But the light would not burn.

No matter how hard Margaret wished and hoped for the light in her lighthouse to shine, it remained very dark and the only light that could be seen for miles and miles from the north, south, east and west was from a very small flicker of a blue flashlight with yellow and green stickers in the shapes of half moons and stars stuck to the sides that shined from the second floor of a two-story house on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse.

Outside, the wind was blowing and blaring and howling and hurling and the rain started to fall and fall.

The rain was falling and falling and pouring and pouring and all of the sudden Margaret saw a boat in the ocean. The boat was topsy and turvy and it was moving this way and that way and there was a bell on the boat that was blinging and blanging and ringing and clanging and calling for help as it headed for the rocks on the shore near the bottom of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse that was not shining.

"This is terrible, terrible" thought Margaret. "This is terrible, and I must do something! Something must be done…"

But what could Margaret do from the second floor of a two-story house on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse?

Margaret shined her flashlight out of her bedroom window and searched for the boat. It was not there! "Where did it go?" thought Margaret. "It was there and now it's gone!" Margaret put on her orange raincoat and her pink, rubber boots that did not match and she ran outside to the edge of the cliff at the end of the road near the lighthouse, shining her flashlight with the yellow and green stickers in the shapes of half moons and stars on it over the side of the cliff near her lighthouse. "There it is!" she screamed. She started waving and screaming and waving and shining her flashlight and all of the sudden the boat stopped coming toward the rocks on the shore.

The boat had stopped.

The boat was safe.

And Margaret smiled.

Though it was not daytime when Margaret shined her blue flashlight with the yellow and green stickers in the shapes of half moons and stars on it from her second floor window of her two-story house on the edge of the cliff at the end of the road on the outskirts of town near the lighthouse which saved the boat that was topsy and turvy and moving this way and that way with the bell was blinging and blanging and ringing and clanging and calling for help, the newspapers all claimed that "Margaret Saves the Day" and they printed a picture of Margaret with her light brown hair that rests on her shoulders, but sometimes covers her face when the wind blows and her green-colored eyes and olive-colored skin on her chubby face with freckles on her nose wearing her orange raincoat and pink rubber boots that did not match standing next to her lighthouse.

In the picture, Margaret is holding her flashlight. And she is smiling.

The End.